


this is not the thong song

by helios_ (neocitz)



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Australia, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-15
Updated: 2018-07-15
Packaged: 2019-06-10 18:31:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,315
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15297486
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/neocitz/pseuds/helios_
Summary: Jisung just wants to buy some thongs, but Jaemin makes it harder than it should be





	this is not the thong song

**Author's Note:**

> Un-beta'd 
> 
> I don't even really know where this came from, I just wanted to mix things up whilst working on shitty supes

Jisung doesn’t have a single thong lying around the house. He’s not entirely sure how that’s possible, but he’s checked _everywhere_ and that includes the shady cupboard by the front door that no-one touches on pain of death. The thing about thongs, he’s realised in his teenage wisdom, is that they’re the sort of things that lie around in your way until you need them.

And then they get sacrificed to some higher beings and you’re left wanting them.

‘You’re coming to the beach, right?’ Donghyuck is Jisung’s next door neighbour, so instead of calling like a regular person he nods politely at Jisung’s mum and then barges into Jisung’s room. ‘Johnny and Doyoung’s offered to drive us up so we don’t have to take the bus.’

It’s a welcome change. Normally they take the train down to the closest beach, which is crowded and more than a bit dirty in Jisung’s opinion. With their entire extended friendship group going (which is a large one) they’ve got enough cars to go around without overcrowding, and they can go to a _nice_ beach.

‘I am, I just need to find my thongs first,’ Jisung crawls half under the bed, reaching around in the dust to see if he’d kicked them there last week in his misguided attempt to clean up. ‘I don’t know how I’ve lost them.

‘Dude,’ Donghyuck raises an eyebrow from where he’s sitting at Jisung’s desk, ‘just borrow Jeno’s.’

‘Ew,’ Jisung crinkles his nose. ‘I would rather die.’

 

 

Jisung shifts where he’s standing, in the shade Mark had managed to nab outside the shopping centre when he parked. The rest of the cars are dotted around the carpark, no-one wanting to park too far from the centre nor in the full sun. The harsh summer sun is beating down on them, about trying to melt them into a crisp, and Jisung feels uncomfortable everywhere.

It would be just slightly more comfortable if he had his thongs.

‘We’ve got everything, yeah?’ Mark asks, loading the bags into the boot. It’s his first year driving up and because he’s only allowed one passenger, he’s offered to take most of the food and bags up with him. ‘Besides the ice?’

‘Almost,’ Jisung sets the coke bottles down as carefully as he can, hoping they won’t move around too much on the hour and a half drive. They’ve got three bottles, one for Taeil and two for the remaining seventeen members of their friendship group, and they can’t risk losing one to getting too shaken up. ‘I need to run to Woolies really quick though.’

‘That’s the _first_ place we went,’ Mark groans, looking at the many and varied green bags in front of him. ‘Why couldn’t you have gotten what you needed then?’

‘Yeah but I forgot,’ Jisung isn’t cute, not at all, but his determination to be fierce to Mark is cut down by Mark’s impossibly large grin. ‘I’ll be like five minutes, max.’

‘What do you even need?’ Jaemin asks. ‘We doubled checked everything, like twice.’

‘Yeah, but,’ Jisung looks down at his poor, sweaty converse-clad feet. ‘I just need to go grab some thongs and some deodorant.’

‘Why are you going to Woolies?’ Jaemin asks, horror painting his tone. ‘That’s like the worst place to buy them. We’re at a shopping centre, if we’re going to buy you some new thongs then we’re going to do it properly.’

‘Please,’ Jisung groans, tipping his head back up and suddenly incredibly glad that Chenle and everyone else are across the carpark. ‘Can I just do this alone?’

‘No,’ Jaemin shakes his head, grabbing Jisung’s shoulders. ‘No, you can’t.’

 

 

Mark only ends up following them because he knows that Jaemin and Jisung can get distracted if left to their own devices. He’s muttering the whole time about how the car’s going to be too hot and everything going to go funny, but Jaemin just cuts him down with a dirty glare.

‘Mark,’ he pronounces, leading through the shopping centre with expert navigational skills, ‘you can’t half-ass buying thongs. You have to do this properly, I’m not letting Jisung buy sub-par thongs.’

‘It’s not that bad,’ Jisung protests, only moving because Jaemin is dragging him by the wrist. ‘I just want to go to Woolies or something.’

Jaemin rounds on both of them, and it’s almost terrifying. ‘Woolies have shit quality thongs, and they’re all covered with the Australian flag because why not. I’m not letting you walk around with the Australian flag on any part of your body.’

‘Jaemin,’ he whines. ‘What about Target then?’ That would be a pretty quick in and out, even though Jisung never knows where he is in a Target and continually gets lost. The sound of revulsion that hacks its way up Jaemin’s throat seems to indicate that this is not an option for Jisung either and he’s shoved forward into a store that’s full of price tags that makes him wince.

He’s a teenager, he’s not made of enough money to shop at expensive stores. He’s perfected the balance between spending as little money as possible for good quality things and he’s not sure if thongs fall underneath this category.

‘Why do you need new thongs anyway, I thought your last ones were fine?’ Mark asks as Jaemin immediately hunts down an overworked, exhausted employee to point him in the direction of the thongs he’s after.

‘My mum threw them out,’ Jisung says, blushing. Mark winces in sympathy.

 

 

‘They’re thirty-five dollars,’ Jisung gasps, looking at the thongs that Jaemin’s recommending. ‘That’s a rip-off!’

‘They’re _good quality_ ,’ Jaemin says, shoving the thongs at Jisung’s chest. ‘They won’t fall apart like your last ones did.’

There’re only so many times you can fix a thong with the little plastic thing from your bread packet and duct tape before your mum deems them irreparable, awful and just plain useless. It turns out that after Jisung’s right thong had fallen apart for the sixth time, his mum had picked it up between two fingers and dropped it in the rubbish bin.

As such, he’s been wearing his Converses around for the past little while. It’s not that bad, but it’s mid-January in Australia and Jisung is a teenage boy and perhaps his feet are really starting to reek without ventilation.

‘They’re pieces of rubber,’ he says, bending the pair in his hand. ‘I can get these for six dollars at Target,’ he tries putting them back on the display but Jaemin actually lets out a little snarling sound. ‘I can get Yuta’s fair-trade biodegradable ones for less!’

‘Well you should have thought of that before you stuffed your feet into non-breathable canvas,’ Jaemin sneers, trying to see if he could find a slightly cheaper pair of thongs for Jisung. Jisung doesn’t think there’s going to be much luck, if he’s honest.

 ‘You could borrow Jeno’s spares?’ Mark offers, and Jaemin’s disgust instead settles on him. It actually makes Mark flinch back a bit, and Jisung doesn’t blame him. Normally, Jaemin is one of their nicer friends but when he’s mad about something he can be awful.

‘Jeno’s feet are nasty, no-one is touching those,’ and Jisung nods along in agreement.

There’s a moment when Mark seems to realise what they mean, before the older boy shudders once. No-one likes Jeno when his shoes are off, not even Doyoung.

‘I just want to go to Woolies,’ Jisung begs, looking up at Jaemin and playing up every part of him being the youngest of the group, ‘and pay the bare minimum so that I don’t sweat through my shoes or burn the bottoms of my feet. Please.’

Jaemin shakes his head, walking over to the registers. ‘Consider this an early birthday present then.’

‘Worst birthday present ever,’ Jisung mutters, wishing he could elbow Mark in the ribs as the older boy snorts out a laugh.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I don't think the impact of this is quite as funny as I thought it was going to be but it was a fun write, hopefully you made it to the end and found my super hilarious and clever twist *stock thumbs up pose* 
> 
>  
> 
> twt's currently down but here is my [cc](http://curiouscat.me/neocitz)


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